The TRADEway Story

C. L. Brown

It all started, a long time ago, when a man set off to create a better future for his family. Captain C.L. Brown was a poor junk dealer but was comfortable taking risks and learned to take appropriate ones. So, with a handshake and a loan, C.L. purchased a dried up oil field, hoping to find junk left behind by the oil companies he bought it from. He blasted the wells with nitro-glycerine to dig up metal that he could trade. But one day, his blasting struck oil! Because of his risky blasting methods, he became known as "Torpedo Brown," but it was his income that truly rocketed!

E.G. Hall

Many years later, an investor, named Elvis Hall, married wealthy Captain Brown's daughter and inherited the oil company. He took a different kind of risk and used his investment knowledge to expand the oil company into the Permian Basin in West Texas and the family business continued to grow and thrive.

Fred & David Mitchell

Elvis' daughter, Joye, married a retired F.B.I. special agent named Fred Mitchell. Fred was a man of many talents, his favorite was woodworking. He used his oil funds and learned investment knowledge, to start the Van Zoren pipe organ company with his only son, David. They later sold the pipe organ company to the CBS Television Network.

David with family, 2001

Fred's son, David, graduated from Baylor University in 1978 with an MBA degree and wanted to use his business and marketing knowledge to set a path of his own. He was an entrepreneur at heart but he still believed strongly in the idea of the family business. At the age of 24, his life suddenly changed–driving home from the oil fields, he became a Christian and dedicated his life to serving the Lord and helping other people.

David Teaching

David became the pastor of a church in Texas yet never had to take a salary from the church because of his successful business endeavors. He realized the power of the skill sets passed down from C.L., Elvis, and Fred, and thought it would be great for other people to learn the importance of taking risks, investing wisely, and doing what they love. So David took what he had learned from his family about risk taking and investing, coupled it with his love of teaching, and decided to build a system to help others learn to do the same. He developed the TRADEway system. By sharing how his family went from poor junk dealers to titans of business, David has helped thousands of families across America learn how to take control of their finances, inspiring them to pursue their own American Dream, chasing their biggest goals, by taking small steps.